the kommandeur - ahiks
TRANSCRIPT
From Your President Bob Best Today is Monday March 25, 2019. I'm sitting at my com-
puter in my den looking out the window at a gray, cloudy after-noon. The weather service is calling for more rain through the week and into the weekend. Yuk! ...WHERE IS SPRING?! :- (I know I am not alone in wishing for those loooong warm sum-mer days. I cannot wait until we start getting them, but in the meantime, since I am spending time indoors, I plan to make good use of the time. I plan to pull out some of those new games that are still in shrink wrap that I have bought over the last few months and try them out! :-) I'm thinking I will try to get GMT's new Space Corp 2025-2300AD on the table. It has solitaire rules, so I may give it a try.
On my other AHIKS games that I am playing SPI's Wurzburg, being played with member Bill Klitzke
has reached the final game turn. It was a slugfest between the Soviets and the Americans over control of the city hexes in Wurzburg. The final assault on the last turn was made by the Soviet 4/39 in hex 1317 against the American 1/2 armor hold-ing the critical road junction in hex 1218. That road junction was key in allowing supply and communications to flow be-tween the American held Wurzburg city hexes and the southern edge of the map. Victory conditions for the Americans required that road to be held open and free of Soviet ZOCs and occupy-ing units. With massive artillery support from both sides, 4/39 was able to prevail and forced 1/2 armor to withdraw, thus se-curing a victory for the Soviets! (See attached photo.)
I want to thank Bill for an excellent and fun couple of games. Bill, I really enjoyed playing with you. You are a very skilled tactician and this one could have gone either way. Bill and I are now in the process of reporting the results of this game and setting up our next match up. We are thinking Chi-nese Farm from the same SPI quad game for our next set.
This is a good point to remind all our members to report the results of your games to both Dave Bergman our Ratings Offi-cer and also to Duncan Rice our Match Coordinator when you finish them. We all thank you.
My other game I have going is with Omar DeWitt, our Edi-tor. Omar beat the pants off of me in our first game of VP Games' Target: Leningrad. The photo below is from our sec-ond game. The German's are closing in on Leningrad in turn 6 of an 8-turn game. The Master Tactician that he is, Omar has succeeded in delaying the German's just enough to cause some real doubt that I will be able to breach the defenses of Lenin-grad and capture the city by the end of the game. It looks like there will be some really tense die rolling in the next couple of turns. (See photo attached.)
The KommandeurVolume 54 Number 2 Publication of AHIKS April 2019
Our Plaque Winners As we announced in the last issue, George Phillies won the
Mark A. Fassio Award for Best Article of 2018 for his article
"What Are the Fundamentals of a Game's Design?" George received a $50 check, and he also received the 2018 Fas-
sio Award plaque. George has sent along a "selfie" of him with his plaque. Thanks, George, and congratulations again on an excellent article!
We also have a photo of Steve Andriakos holding his win-ner's Plaque for his outstanding play in Duncan Rice's Break-out Normandy tournament that just finished up. Steve, con-gratulations on winning the tournament!
We have two other winner's plaques to look forward to in 2019. Currently playing is Robert Granville's Diplomacy Tour-nament and Art Dohrman's Panzer Blitz/ Panzer Leader tour-nament. You can find instant updates on these games at our AHIKS Facebook page and also here in the newsletter.
Around AHIKS In other news, There is a new look to the "Members Only"
sections main menu. Our Webmaster, Tom Thornsen, is work-ing on the AHIKS Website to add a "Games For Sale" page to the website. He hopes to have that up and running soon, so if you have some games you want to move along to get more shelf space here is a great place to offer them to our members. And, if you are looking for something special to play or for your collection, you may just find that rare treasure posted on the AHIKS For Sale page. Coming soon to our website! :-) So, until next time... Happy Gaming!
SPI's Modern Battles Quad - Wurzburg.
The Kommandeur 2
The 2019 PB/PL tournament has kicked off and is well un-derway: ten players, two games completed and six more in pro-gress or about to start. It's not too late to join in! Group play will continue at least for the rest of this calendar year, possibly longer, to be followed by semifinal and final rounds. Bill Scott has generously donated two games from his stash, one Panzerblitz and one Panzer Leader, to be awarded as prizes. Both are punched but in very good condition, with the excep-tion that the boxes are worn. If you're interested in participat-ing, contact Art Dohrman at [email protected] . Thanks and best regards, Art Dohrman
Game Review
Panzerblitz/Panzer Leader tournament underway!
Gettysburg 150 designed by Wylie © 2013 Worthington Games $40 boxed Reviewed by Omar DeWitt
Another game on the battle at Gettysburg. This is a simpler game. The units are 7/8 of an inch on a
side (printed on two sides) with correspondingly larger hexes. The rules are 6 pages. There are four scenarios as well as the full game.
Movement and combat are governed by Action Points. Each scenario gives each side a number of Action Points each turn, and these are supplemented by a die roll. It costs one Action Point to move a unit, or one for a unit to fire, or two if a unit melees. There is advance after combat but it is not mentioned in the rules (since units move and/or fire one at a time, another unit could advance) and there are no zones of control.
The units have Morale Points. When they are hit in combat, the unit is flipped over (or replaced by a smaller version). At zero, the unit is out of the game. Leaders in the same hex may attempt to rally a damaged unit.
In attacking, units roll from one to three dice. A six is al-ways a hit, sometimes a five as well.
For movement a unit usually has 2 or 3 movement points, but if a unit is never next to an enemy unit, it has 4 or 6 move-ment points, and if always on a road, 6 or 9 movement points.
Terrain affects the number of dice that can be thrown and movement.
The map is mounted and in six connected pieces. I had trou-ble getting it to lie flat.
I have been playing the game face-to-face, and there have been no real problems. There has been confusion on retreats after melee.
This is a reasonable game, but not one I would rush back to.
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VP Games - Target: Leningrad
George Phillies with his Mark A. Fassio Best Article for 2018 Plaque.
Steve Andriakos with his plaque for winning the Breakout Normandy tournament.
The Kommandeur 3
From the Editor
Book Reviews
As AHIKS strives to keep costs and dues down, there is something you can do to help. Our Perpetual Fund, started by Bruce Monnin and Frederick Kraus, can always use more donations. The interest from the Fund helps the Society. A few dollars from you could help AHIKS become totally self sustaining. Give it some thought. Send Brian Stretcher a couple of dollars. Especially since there are no dues this year. Brian Stretcher, 117 Camellia Trail, Brevard, NC 28712
War Games and Their History by C.G. Lewin $40 Fonthill Media (Amazon sells it for $27) 272 pages, color illustrations Reviewed by Omar DeWitt
You may remember in the October 2018 issue (Vol. 53, No. 5) we published an article from George Phillies on an old game in his possession, Blockade, A Game for Armchair Admirals. I was quite impressed with the article and the fact that there were old wargames. When SPI held its first Origins, III I believe, I presented a timeline of wargaming. The earliest game was one, I again believe, Lou Zocchi owned. The name eludes me.
Blockade is mentioned in War Games as being designed by Nathan Reinherz, who also designed Strategy, published in 1938. The game pieces are three cargo ships, three warships, two planes, and two submarines for each player. Combat be-tween adjacent ships was resolved by spinning the dial and con-sulting the proper column. The counters appear from the photo-graph to be metal replicas.
What really wowed me about “War Games and their His-tory” was the tremendous number of old wargames, starting in 1600. The index in the back of the book listing wargames is twelve pages long of small type. Many of the early boxed wargames used tracked movement: the units moved along a "road" and performed actions as they went. Some used squares over which units moved. Most games had well illustrated boxes.
War itself seems to have generated wargames. Lewin writes, "In 1898 the Spanish-American War produced an excel-lent group of naval games in the USA. At the start of the First World War there were many new games of a military or naval character, both in Britain and Germany."
The games discussed run to the modern times, but the expla-nations are fewer and shorter. To me the earlier games are more interesting. At one time or another, I owned most of the modern games.
There is no way to really review this book. It is filled with many photographs and short summaries of the rules of many, many old wargames. I was quite entranced with the book.
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MISSION 101—the untold story of the SOE and WW2 in Ethiopia, by Duncan McNab 223 pages, ©2012 Reviewed by Tom Oleson
One of the 5 Australian participants in this daring com-mando foray was the uncle of the author.
A few years ago, when it was still Don Greenwood's con-vention, I saw a huge map of the horn of Africa, made for a monster game of WW2 in that area. Anybody know its fate and whether this little unit was represented?
SOE stands for Special Operations Executive. There were 250,000 Italian armed forces occupying Ethio-
pia, and this tiny group, infiltrated from adjacent British-controlled Sudan, stirred up the local populace against them, to considerable effect. Nearly every page has some geographical reference of where the group was operating in Ethiopia. Too bad no map.
The NY Times today writes of demonstrations in Milan against the Italian government's crackdown on African immi-grants. Some years ago an Italian friend told me that due to what his country did in Africa, they were now obliged to accept African immigrants. Many Italians think the 600,000 they now have is enough.
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Spring is upon us in all its glory. Tree blossoms are with us. Warmer weather is here.
I continue to be amazed at the number of new games avail-able to us. Also, it is strange how they come in bunches. Last issue there were relatively few new games. This issue there are quite a few. Do you buy many games? Do you, like me, have several stacks of shrink-wrapped games? If so, good for you. It is our job not only to play games but to buy them.
No, I haven’t done any more on my Mark IV. The pieces still reside where they were a couple of months ago. I haven’t answered Bob Best’s last move in Target: Leningrad. Too many bad moves.
The newsletter needs, of course, more articles. I’m sure many of you have tried a new game and could write a few words. We can read the publishers’ comments, but they tend to be a bit biased. A short comment from you would be a clearer guide.
The conventions are coming up. I always enjoy reading what other members have seen and done. Everyone’s experi-ence is different; we’d like to print them all.
Currently, I am reading “Waterloo, The French Perspective” by Andrew Field. As we all know, the victors tell the story more loudly and put a bit of the tale in their favor. Field tries to clear up a few points. Aside from the truth of the fight, it is clear to me that the French really botched the battle. And the weather didn’t help.
The die is rolling.
The Kommandeur 4
After Action Report by Bob Best
3D, giving us a plus 1 column boost to our escort roll on Table 5-4.) That boost in "Aggressive Little Friends" helped drive off attacking fighters through the rest of the mission.
In the second wave of attacking fighters CPL Gates our ball turret gunner also got another victory when he nailed a Me-110 at the top of a vertical climb. The Kraut fighter's right engine burst into flames and the wing just folded up. There were two good 'chutes seen as the pilot and his gunner managed to bail out as the twin-engine fighter spiraled down to earth. Gates was awarded a Victory Credit for the kill making his total 3 1/3 so far.
1st LT Schmidt firing the left cheek gun on Spray Fire and MSG Jennings in the top turret managed to drive off another Me-110 attacking from 10:30 level, while Sloan on the tail guns and Gates in the tail drove off another Me-110 attacking from 6 o'clock level. Our "aggressive friends" drove off the Me-109 from 6 o'clock low.
The action tapered off in Zones 4, 5, and 6 as the enemy fighters focused their attention on the other cells and groups. (Lady Luck did smile on us AGAIN. I got a reroll on 1 dice roll on the Random Events Table.)
In the target zone, both inbound and outbound, the flak was light, and I was pretty calm in my "longest minute" ride flying straight and level as Landers took over and ran the bomb run. It looked good to me but those recon boys who assessed target damage for our strikes said we were off target and only got 5% of the load into the 1,000 foot circle around the target! How they figure that I don't know.
There were a few Kraut fighters waiting for us as we left the target, but Sweet Sue and the high cell were not attacked.
It was Zone 5 that "Scared the Crap" right out of me! An Fw-190 dove at us from 12 o'clock high. As we were the top cell MSG Jennings in the top turret had a clear shot at him. His twin 50s in the turret began to pound, and I could hear shell casings raining down on the steel deck behind me. The fighter kept get-ting bigger and bigger and his cannons were winking red spar-kles at us. I heard that sledge hammer Ka-THUNK!... Ka-THUNK! as a couple of rounds from his guns hit Sweet Sue. Jennings was right on him and the 190's wing came off as a stream of tracers converged on the wing root area. The Fw-190 began to spiral as it continues STRAIGHT AT US! (Eleven!! ... OH NO!!! I failed the first Collision Roll on Table 5-16!)
My heart jumped into my throat as I fixated on that still spinning propeller as it got larger and LARGER in the wind-screen! The Fw-190 was inverted and burning, and the pilot was slumped over the controls. He was headed RIGHT FOR US! Sweat ran down my sides and bathed my face as the plane just kept getting closer and CLOSER.
(I took out my trusty red 1D6 die. Blew on it, and then rolled it in my dice tray on the control console. OH NO!!! A SIX!!! It can' t be... But then I heard Lady Luck calling me. OH, YES ... that REROLL from the Random Events Table I rolled earlier.
I took a breath and wiped the sweat out of my eyes. Once more I blew on the RED 1D6; just for luck! I watch it arc out of my hand and bounce lazily into the tray. It hit the edge and rebounded as it spun around. Waiting with baited breath until it stopped I saw it read... ONE! ... YAY! Sweet Sue barely is missed by the careening Fw-190. Whew!
For those of you who have been following my B-17F bomber "Sweet Sue" flying in Steve Dixon's Target For Today campaign game, here is her Mission 12 After Action Report.
"Sweet Sue" is a B-17F model Flying Fortress bomber based at Molesworth Air Base in England. She is assigned to the 8th Air Force's 800th Bomb Wing/815th Bomb Squadron. 800th BG/815th Sqdn -Sweet Sue 5 Jun 43 Mission 12/ TGT - Air Factory in Frankfurt, Germany (Zone 7) Position # - High Cell (Position 11) Tail End Charlie Crew: Pilot: CPT Bob Best Co-Pilot: 1LT "Sandy" Sanderson Bombardier: 2LT Kelly Landers Navigator: 1LT Peter Schmidt Engr-TT : MSG Don Jennings Radio: T/Sgt Orv Reichert Ball Turret: CPL Rusty Gates Right Waist: CPL Dave Miller Left Waist: T/SGT Nate Thompson Tail Gunner: CPL Mark Sloan From the pilot's diary:
A piece of good news. Last mission CPL Rex King our Tail gunner got hit. Rex took shrapnel in the chest. The doctors say he got that Million Dollar Wound! He's lucky to be alive and, of course, he will spend a long time recovering, but the doctors say he will make it and eventually recover completely. He is await-ing evacuation back to the States. King is being replaced by CPL Mark Sloan. Sloan is from Washington State and has three mis-sions under his belt. He wants to be a doctor when the war is over.
Another piece of good news, our navigator Peter Schmidt got his promotion to 1st LT. His stood for the promotion party at the O Club last night.
We were "fragged" for Mission 12 to Frankfort Germany. It was another Maximum Effort against Germany's Aircraft Indus-try. We were going to Zone 7 inside Hitler's Third Reich. Sweet Sue and the 815th were assigned to the High Cell this time. Sweet Sue drew Tail End Charlie so we knew we were going to see some extra action from the 6 o'clock low positions, and I gave Sloan our new tail gunner an extra heads up to be alert for them.
The weather for both takeoff and landing was poor. This English weather really sucks! It also made linking up with our escorts harder and usually contributed to poor escort support. We got off OK and got formed up and then headed for Fortress Europe.
We were in the middle of the pack of bomber combat boxes heading for Frankfurt. We saw some enemy aircraft attacking another combat box but none came after our formation until we had crossed the coast. The 800th BW got hit by heavy opposi-tion over Belgium. I felt lucky as the first wave of fighters came in. None attacked the High Cell and Lady Luck smiled on us as our escorts were really aggressive and stuck with us through the rest of the mission. (I rolled 5 on the Random Events Table 5-
The Kommandeur 5
Back in the cockpit I recovered my senses enough to see that I had pushed forward on the controls enough to send Sweet Sue into a dive, and we had barely missed being hit. Fortu-nately, being tail-end Charley I did not collide with any other bomber, and I was able to get back in formation before any other enemy fighter found us.
The rest of the flight was just a blur. Jennings claimed the Fw-190 and was awarded the kill. Sloan in the tail confirmed the 190 hit the ground. No 'chute seen. I put Jennings in for a Silver Star for his shooting ability. That made 12 1/2 victories for him!
Landing went well even in the poor weather, and I am still shaking as we are sitting in debriefing. My hand is shaking as I finish my medicinal Scotch!
Sweet Sue had minor damage and our crew chief said he would have the damage fixed by next mission.
An Fw-190 was claimed and credited by MSG Jennings (top turret) and CPL Gates claimed and received credit for a Me-110.
No other claims were made. 2nd LT Landers was off target, and only 5% of the bombs
hit in the target area. Sweet Sue will be ready to fly the next mission.
The Kommandeur 6
I had little knowledge of General Thomas prior to reading this book, other than knowing of him as “The Rock of Chicka-mauga,” as his stand against the Rebels allowed the rest of Rosecrans’ army to successfully withdraw to Chattanooga fol-lowing Bragg’s attack on September 20, 1863, and so prevent-ing a Union disaster. General Thomas was a true fighter and excellent leader of men, breaking Bragg’s army later on Mis-sionary Ridge at Chattanooga, successfully forcing Joseph Johnston to retreat back to Atlanta, and then defeating John Bell Hood in a number of battles around Atlanta. Ultimately, he won a crushing victory against Hood at Nashville, Tennessee, as Sherman was off marching through Georgia and South Caro-lina.
Sadly, Thomas was victimized by his more politically astute contemporaries, U.S. Grant and William T. Sherman, who both took credit for everything while accusing Thomas of being “slow.” As Grant became president after the war with Sherman at his side, it was their version of history that became accepted as fact, until recently. The book explains, however, how Tho-mas’ nature was deliberate and thorough and allowed signifi-cant victories without the needless sacrifice of men in frontal assaults. General Thomas never lost a battle or a movement and was the only Union Commander to destroy two Confederate armies in the field.
The book is well written and insightful. As with any Civil War biography, it starts with Thomas’ childhood, runs through his prewar career to include the war with Mexico and Indian Wars, through the Civil War itself, and then to his sudden death by stroke in 1870. However, there is little information available as to his personal life and family. There is one map per chapter, which is never enough, but the battles are described in satisfac-tory detail, especially for a biography.
Highly recommended, especially if you are looking for something a little different than a biography of the more well-known generals of the war. He should have been known as one, because in ability, he was right up there with Robert E. Lee.
Treasurer’s Report A modest amount of activity this time, as AHIKS awarded
prizes for the Breakout Normandy Tournament, and a contri-bution came in. Thank you very much, Jim Mueller! Total balance 1-30-19: $ 8,692.07 Dividend 1-31-19: 1.46 Dividend 2-28-19: 1.33 Contribution: 10.00 Bob Best – Plaque reimbursement -68.72 George Phillies BKN Tourney Prize: -50.00 Total balance 3-30-19: $ 8,586.14 Until next time!
Caught up, at least! Although it has taken some effort, I have finally managed
to at least catch up with all of my game moves of late, with no more than a couple of days since the last one showed up in my email inbox. That, despite this column to put together, a couple of fundraisers, taking on a new board position for a non-profit, and working on spring cleanup out in the yard. It has helped, certainly, that I have now fully unplugged myself from my youth soccer duties of many years. Free at last! I will miss it, but I am looking forward to getting back those 16 Saturdays each year!
While I have not yet found the time to start building the WWI Mk I Male Tank I have had sitting on my desk for over a year now, I have at least started perusing the rules from some of the “new” games on my study shelves, some of which have been sitting there for over a year. I still hope to learn the COIN system of Pendragon and Liberty or Death, relearn the re-issued Red Star/White Eagle, try my hand at some solitaire play in Raiders of the Deep and Nightfighter Ace, take a seri-ous look at the interesting WW2 subject in Cataclysm, and see if the one-map, card-driven strategic game of Japan vs. the US Pacific Tide is as insightful, challenging, and simple as the interweb says it is.
And then, there are some others I have been looking at but have yet to buy, including a new tactical system from GMT call The Last Hundred Yards, and Compass Games’ Battle Hymn, which is a new brigade-level Civil War system featur-ing Gettysburg and Pea Ridge. I passed on that one when it first came out, as I had some others already in the pipeline, but following the book I just read (see below) and the fact that none of the several games I have on Gettysburg (Gettysburg ’64, Gettysburg ’77, Cemetery Ridge, Lee vs. Meade, and Thunder at the Crossroads, plus numerous titles covering portions of the battle) have ever proved themselves both man-ageable and particularly satisfying, I may give it a look as well.
Next time, look for an article co-authored by Jeff Miller and me about things to do and not do in the play of multi-player games by Vassal. Just not enough time to get it ready for this issue!
Book Review: Master of War, by Benson Bobrick
This book was loaned to me by one of my attorney col-leagues. It is a biography of General George H. Thomas, a Un-ion corps and army commander during the civil war. Written in 2009, it took me awhile to get around to reading it, because it is an actual paper book and not an ebook, and my reading habits have evolved some over the last few years.
Treasury Notes Brian Stretcher
The Kommandeur 7
12.4 REINFORCEMENTS
Reinforcements may enter at any friendly North, South, East, or West mapboard edge. New units may arrive by ground, rail, sealift, or airlift and count against stacking limits. Reinforce-ments are fully combat-capable on Turn of entrance. 1946 Brian Eagmin, FPO 1947 Bob Prince, Westminster, CA 1948 Michael Woodgerd, Alexandria, VA 1949 John Stuart, Seguin, TX 1950 Jim Stichter, Clifton, CO 1951 Jim Dowrey, Boxborough, MA
Multiplayer Info From Jeff Miller
[This article is from Kommandeur Volume 32, Number 2, April 1997, when members were known to submit articles.]
I have played wargames for more than fifteen years now. My theatres of command have run from single squads in the venerable Squad Leader series to the entire war effort in World in Flames. I have faced up to Caesar and denied him control of ancient Rome. I have jumped with the Mobile Infan-try onto the Arachnid home planet of Klendathu. I have seen skillful Confederate commanders who won independence for the South in 1863 and I have seen NLF leaders who lost Viet-nam to the U.S. in late 1965. Yes, I believe that I have seen them all. I consider myself competent and challenging, re-sourceful and skilled in any board situation versus any oppo-nent.
... Until now. But let me tell my story... Recently my girlfriend, Lisa, purchased a copy of Up Front
for me. I read the rules, considered the strategies, then asked her for a game. Let me digress for a moment here and enlighten the reader. Lisa is a 6th year Registered Nurse, very intelligent, and quick to take up on new ideas. We had played a few of my other games Bismarck, Kingmaker, and Guerilla being her favourites. She disliked Roads to Gettysburg, declaring, "Everyone is named 'Lee' or related to him." The designer of Magic Realm, she felt, developed the game "with the sole pur-pose of making the rules as complex as possible." So these are her gaming interests.
Now, to return to the requested game of Up Front. The rules were easily learnt with the programmed instruction and the relevant copies of the General. Thus ensued a match of the "Meeting of Patrols" scenario, Lisa taking the American forces in that and all subsequent games. I lost. I consider a defeat a learning experience, an opportunity not to repeat my previous mistakes, and an incentive to drive for victory in the next game. So I was not disheartened. Some ten games or so later, I was forced to realise that the won/loss ratio was 70% to 30% in my partner's favour. My cardboard warriors were subjected to with-ering amounts of American firepower, whilst I struggled to find a fire card in my hand to muster anything remotely respectable.
I re-read the rules to ensure we were not doing something incorrectly. I re-examined the aforementioned articles hoping to glean a tactical advantage. I called upon my years of accumu-lated wargaming experience. All to no avail. Now, when I hear the dreaded words, "Up Front, dear?" I find myself making excuses to avoid another debacle. I do the dishes (as if they are important!). I mow the lawn frequently and at funny hours. If all else fails, I attempt to direct the request to a different game.
HELP ME, AHIKS! Have I not been a conscientious mem-ber, paid my dues timely, played my games fairly and quickly? I call upon the accumulated gaming wisdom of the entire Soci-ety. Send in your articles on Up Front. Give me your hints on how to win repeatedly. Allow me to progress to the other games in my collection. Please, let me be a whole gamer again!
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Up Front, Dear? by Kev Reid #1315
Greetings all, Not too much in the way of new additions to the multiplayer
game list this go around. EIA is still the closest to starting next, although I think A3R
is going to give it a run for its money. We have one game that is almost ready to wrap up, as the Allies try to hammer their way into Germany from France, Italy, Balkans, and Poland, but time is running out. After that I believe we will have enough players to kick off the next one.
The Here I Stand game is off and running. My Ottoman Empire has cleared the Balkans of Vlad the Impaler influence and have settled into a peaceful existence. Although I fear France is now turning the other nations on me for religious rea-sons – and to distract the other nations from the New World.
So if you miss the old gaming group that used to meet FTF,
throw your hat in the ring for a multiplayer game. Not quite the same but it does give you more time to plot the demise of eve-
ryone else in the game. I tried out Time of Crisis at PrezCon this year and was im-
pressed. Would love to get a game of this one going, although I need to come up with a strategy as I got kicked all over the board.
Speaking of PrezCon, I think I lost pretty much every game but had a great time. Of course my wife won her first tourna-ment and was in several semifinals/finals so I may never live
this year down.
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The Kommandeur 8
Open Match Requests from Duncan Rice
Match Codes A: ADC2 C: Cyberboard E: Email F: Fast Play G: Will Gamemaster L: Learning Game
P: Postal Mail S: Slow Play T: A.C.T.S.. V: V.A.S.S.A.L. X: Non-rated Game Z: Zuntzu
Match Coordinator To accept one of the listed matches or have a new match
listed, email to: [email protected]
1914 AH John Trosky 1554 CVS Adv Squad Leader MMP Charles Mock 1873 E Adv Squad Leader Starter Kits 1 & 2 Michael Plummer 1919 Adv Third Reich AH Michael Mitchell 1086 Arab Israeli Wars AH Scott McAninch 1718 PE Battle of the Bulge AH Rene Charbonneu 1934 Barbarossa to Berlin GMT Andrew Patience 1646 Blitzkrieg '75 AH Jeff Bullard 1901 PLV Bloody Hell HFDG Jay Unnerstall 1264 EPS Caesar's Leigions AH Charles Sutherland 1604 V Case Blue by MMP Rob Franze 1921 VNX D-Day '61 by AH Richard Passow 1453 EPLX Conflict of Heroes AG Lourens te Beer 1908 EL Dien Bien Phu: Final Gamble Legion W. Andrew Patience 1646 East Front Series by GMT Rob Franze 1921 VNX France 1940 Vae Victis Andrew Patience 1646 Frederick the Great SPI Andrew Patience 1646 To Green Fields Beyond SPI John Trosky 1554 CVS Grenadier SPI Charles Sutherland 1604 V Great Game by Legion W. Andrew Patience 1646 Guns of August AH J ohn Trosky 1554 CV Imperium Romanum Rene Charbonneu 1934 Jutland AH John Trosky 1554 CVSL Korean War VG Paul Koenig 1577 Liepzig SPI Charles Sutherland 1604 V Midway Clark Evans 1933 FV Mortain Counterattack DG Jay Unnerstall 1264 EPS Napoleon's Last Battles Charles Sutherland 1604 Panzer Blitz AH Scott McAninch 1718 PE Panzer Leader AH Scott McAninch 1718 PE Phalanx SPI Charles Sutherland 1604 V Red Winter GMT Chuck Leonard 711 VE Richthofen’s War AH John Trosky 1554 CV Rock of the Marne MMP John Trosky 1554 CVL Russia Besieged L2 Mike Paul 1578 Russian Campaign AH Jim Dowrey 1951 Russian Front AH Michael Mitchel 1086 VA Soldiers SPI John Trosky 1554 CVS Squad Leader Clark Evans 1933 LV Stalingrad AH George Phillies 697 VZX Storm Over Arnhem MMP Andrew Patience 1646 Storm Over Dien Bien Phu MMP Andrew Patience 1646 V Storm Over Stalingrad MMP Andrew Patience 1646 Tank on Tank LnL Duncan Rice 1394 V Third Reich AH Clark Evans 1933 FV Titan AH Jim Dowrey 1951 Turning Point Stalingrad AH Andrew Patience 1646 War and Peace Jim Dowrey 1951 World War II SPI Charles Sutherland 1604 V
If you are interested in playing any of the following games, contact Jeff Miller (address on page 12).
Advanced Third Reich AH – Rene Charbonneau [1934] Crown of Roses GMT – Mike Kettman (1067) V Dune – Jeff Miller [1303] V Empire in Arms – Kevin Conway [1930] V Empire in Arms – Rene’ Charbonneau [1934] Empire in Arms – Thomas Scarborough [1345] Empire in Arms – Mike Kettman [1067] V Empires of the Middle Ages – Mike Kettman (1067) V Fire in the Lake – Jeff Miller, [1303] V Gunslinger AH - Matt Scheffrahn [1844] VMG Kremlin AH – Jeff Miller [1303] V
Multiplayer Games
Hansa Brandenburg CC Flying Boat, 1916
The Kommandeur 9
Continued from last issue.
Where is the game? I return to a question that I raised above. The ominous ques-
tion is “Where is the game?” For the designer being interro-gated by those to whom a report is being given, the presence of this question should be viewed with deep concern. The implica-tion is that there is a great deal of something in the presentation: background material, artistic development, historic research, pretty pictures on computer screens, but no real indication of what is to be played. Related to this question are the answers that budding designers will sometimes give if asked what sort of the game they are creating.
A designer likely to have great challenges in struggling through to a successful conclusion will say that a game is being designed about vampires, zombies, pirates, or, Goddess pre-serve us, all three at the same time. A designer with some un-derstanding of the question will say that they are designing a hex and counter game (the topic of this article), a tile laying game, or perhaps an auction game (for the latter and many other sorts of games, see my book “Designing Modern Strategy Games.”) The distinction here in answering my question is the distinction in literary fields between having the plot hook for a book and having the plot for a book. If I say that I have a plot hook, I say that the pirate captain and her gang of merry women find an uninhabited island full of zombies and vampires. With some work, each of you should be able to turn that into two or three paragraphs that you spread across the rear face of the pa-perback. In fact, writing that plot hook is a homework problem. However, I also may say that I have a plot outline. The plot outline is an instruction set telling me what I am supposed to write as I go through the novel. If you have a plot for the pirate captain, her crew of merry women, and the island full of endan-gered exotic species in need of protection, you can say what will happen in the novel. That’s very different than the plot hook, which says that the island is full of zombies and vam-pires. To make the point more clearly, the following homework problem at the end of the chapter is generating the plot outline matching the plot hook that you wrote.
Those of you familiar with top-down computer program-ming styles will find the notion of a plot outline extremely fa-miliar, since it is a set of bubbles, each waiting to be expanded into sets of internal bubbles, and then filled in. Thus, if I am writing a molecular dynamics computer program, I might have
initialize input control variables do molecular dynamics analyze molecular motion generate output streams terminate.
If I were writing a computer program to generate random characters for role-playing game, the program might even have a branch:
Generate random character Test if random character is absolutely perfect in all respects If test fails go to 1. If test passes generate output for the character and termi-
nate.
What might a plot hook or plot look like? The plot hook is “Spy novel: Evil spy breaks up romance, is caught and pun-ished, leaving boy and girl re-united.” As an example that some of you will find less than completely familiar, let us consider a plot to match the plot hook. The following is not any spy novel. It is a spy novel as written correctly in the former Soviet Union in the 1930s. The outline might proceed: Boy. Girl. Girl meets boy. Girl shows her enthusiasm for boy by vigorously praising the five-year plan (insert 10 pages from current plan introduc-tion). Boy meets tractor! Boy shows enthusiasm for tractor! Insert extended quotations from Comrade Stalin’s heroic plan for the mechanization of the agricultural collective. Girl meets handsome but depraved spy of the subhuman ci-devant Wall Street capitalist plutocratic interests. Depraved spy reveals his background by attempting to corrupt girl not with good peo-ple’s vodka but with depraved French wine. (Insert here as an aside an extended discussion of the oppressed nature of the he-roic and noble French working classes.) Heroic political worker identifies spy and shoots him. (While doing so, heroic political worker lectures extensively on the elements of the next five-year plan that the spy will undoubtedly fail to be able to sabo-tage.) Now mortally wounded, spy shoots and mortally injures heroic political worker. (Insert select short sections, carefully selected from Pravda, about which the spy boasts, of cases in which he almost sabotaged aspects of the heroic five-year plan but was foiled at the last minute by the KGB.) The mortally wounded political worker laments his imminent death, quoting very extensively from the glorious next five-year plan that he will tragically not see fulfilled to 250% of plan levels. The spy, recognizing at last his errors, offers his body to be used to ad-vance the next five-year plan objectives in medical research, which he describes in detail (13 pages). Depraved spy and he-roic political worker now expire. Boy and girl are reunited. They show their love for each other by singing paeans to the glory of Comrade Stalin. Boy and girl ride off together into the sunset on the people’s tractor, quoting extensively from the thoughts of Comrade Stalin on the central importance of the agricultural collective.
See, I told you that you were unlikely to have read a novel with a plot outline like the one I just gave you. Many of you will even be so lucky that you will never read a novel with this plot outline. Note, very important, that the plot outline gives each of the major events in the plot, and indicates how those events are to be padded by various sorts of scenic and literary discussion. Not only do you know who shoots whom and who falls in love with whom, but you know where you are to quote extensively from which important fundamental work. That’s a plot outline. It tells you what to write, though likely in this case not what you would want to write.
This use of plot outlines to be filled in by the writer is hardly unique to the historical period that I just described. For example, a systematic analysis of the original Tom Swift vol-umes by a distinguished member of MITSFS showed a certain commonality of plot, namely you could be certain that in chap-ter 2 of each book the villain would attempt some villainy, be seen failing but be able to escape, and would therefore be around for more villainy at a later date. If Tom Swift had only carried with him in Chapter Two a copy of his electronic death
What Are the Fundamental Elements of a Game’s Design? by George Phillies
The Kommandeur 10
ray projector, which by World War I standards was really im-pressive, he would have been able to shoot dead the villain im-mediately, thus saving himself all of the misfortunes that he suffers in the remainder of the book. Similarly, the scheme of extending the work by quoting familiar facts is a standard liter-ary device. Who does not recall Pel Torro’s Galaxy 666, in which the arrival on earth of the invincible space demon is de-scribed in terms of its feet crushing through the geological strata of the North Sea, each stratum being lovingly described in appreciable and scientifically accurate detail?
I hope that you now see the distinction to be drawn between a plot hook and a plot. The plot hook is something that you might put onto the rear face of the novel or use as an elevator pitch, but it very certainly does not tell you what happens in the book. Generating the plot hook (‘I have an idea for a book, won’t you write it?’) is very easy. Vast numbers of people who know absolutely nothing about writing are happy to generate plot hooks, inflict them on real authors, and remain baffled when the authors do not express an immediate interest in writ-ing a book with them as a co-author. After all, the non-authors think, they have done the hard part of the work, haven’t they? They found the idea for the book. Those of you who have done the homework problems corresponding to this section already know the answer to this. The non-authors have done almost none of the hard work.
Having said this, I should emphasize that plot hooks are very important. They are the literary device you use to sell the work to the potential reader. They are the technical device you use to sell the project to the potential investor. If your group cannot generate convincing plot hooks, your product may well go unproduced and unread.
Let us return to the question ‘Where is the game?’ If you say “I’m designing a game about the Battle of Bennington” and have accumulated the name of every soldier who fought in the battle, complete maps of the battlefield, and accurate ballistics information for each weapon used in the battle, you appear to have a plot hook and a huge pile of potentially useful historical studies. You do not, however, have anything resembling a game. There is no decision on the representation, on the game map, on any of the factors discussed in the next few chapters, or on any of the rules. You have a game design, or at least a sketch of a game design, when you have something that can, at least approximately, be played.
A fundamental distinction arises between game design and novel writing. The plot of a novel tells the author what he is to write. When the author has written, the novel is finished. The outcome is static, with no or little change likely in the future. The equivalent of plot for a board game, the game design speci-fying the rules and components, tells the players what they are allowed to do, not what they must do. The game design sets the starting point of a game, not every detail of what happens after-ward. The game design is static, but the game outcome is deter-mined by what the players choose to do. With roleplaying and computer games, there are intermediate stages between the static plot of a novel and the fixed content of a game design. Roleplaying game rules generally specify the laws of nature specified by the characters. In some cases, they specify the world in which the characters live. Eventually one reaches game modules, scenarios through which players may pass their characters. Some scenarios specify details of an environment. Others have rigid script immunity, so that the characters are passed from encounter to encounter, no matter what they try to
do along the way. In terms of the history of roleplaying games, the original Dungeons and Dragons specified the local laws of nature. Early rules sets specifying worlds would include White Bear Red Moon and Empire of the Petal Throne. In the same time frame, authors began writing encounter descriptions, an encounter being something that happened along the way. En-counter descriptions were eventually amalgamated into game modules, an idea that came into major use in board wargame design at about the same time. Rolegaming modules ranged from somewhat-free-form to total-script immunity. The senti-ment among serious roleplayers, at the time that scenario mod-ules first appeared, was that their users tended to be persons whose objective in life was to function as a personal living dis-proof of Darwin’s ideas on evolution. However, there are a lot of scenario purchasers, running scenarios being much less work than creating your own world and events, so the market for sce-narios has proved enduring.
The notion of script immunity is that the players have at best a limited ability to affect what happens as the story un-folds. For example, if there is a puzzle that the players must solve, there is little else that they can do until they solve the puzzle. Once they have solved the puzzle, or perhaps even if they have not, the players are shuffled willy-nilly off to their next puzzle. Some readers will perhaps have heard dismayingly dull descriptions of computer games in which one has levels, the levels are a linear array, each level has exactly three strong opponents and one impressively strong opponent…the outcome is like a novel from the Stratemeyer syndicate, without the in-genious inventions but perhaps with imaginatively-described exotic places. The E. E. Smith Lensman novels with progres-sively stronger opponents are a good example of stronger and stronger resistance. If the game features “branching,” the branches may be interwoven so that they are all used, the branches may be illusions so that all choices lead to the same branch, or perhaps there are points at which the story actually does branch and lead to distinct destinations. Board wargames have immutable features built into their designs. The players have a relatively immutable set of starting conditions. The play-ers must then must make their own decisions. A board game can have conditions built into the later game (‘if you capture City Ten by turn thirteen, you receive a tank division as rein-forcements’), but script immunity (‘City Ten automatically sur-renders to the enemy on Turn Fourteen’) is really not a standard feature in game design.
Now, a word of caution about plot outlines and game out-lines. Some people work from the top down. Other people work from the bottom up. A design group that has some of each sort of person can become extremely unhappy, because the people on the two sides can find it extremely difficult to communicate. Let us phrase this in terms of novel writing. The bottom-up writers run into the difficulty that they have absolutely no idea what their characters are going to do until they have written out what the characters have already done, at which point the char-acters have already done it, so there is no need for an outline. The top-down writers ask for a character description and are presented with a draft character chapter which may or may not fit into what the top-down writers would eventually have writ-ten.
The bottom-up people assume that they will rewrite things a lot and discard pieces and maybe move sentences, paragraphs, or entire sections to totally different chapters, but that massive rewrites are a normal state of affairs. The top-down people will
The Kommandeur 11
done that, in Part II of the book we turn to a representative sim-ple board wargame, Stalingrad.
Homework Homework 2-A. The Eurogame Design Game. Make a set
of cards. Each card has on one side a game mechanic, e.g., Bid-ding. Each team of players is dealt a modest number of cards, say, three. Teams go off and return in a month with a new Euro-game in which the mechanisms on their three cards dominate the play of the game. For example, a team dealt tile-laying, area control, and restricted moves might come back with a new Car-casonne. Games are then presented to an independent panel for evaluation.
Homework 2-B. Generate a list of game mechanisms found
in computer games. Keep sharp the distinction between a mechanism, e.g, restricted actions, and a particular implementa-tion of that mechanism. The rules “each player in turn may make three actions from the list of ten allowed actions” and “each player in turn may make two actions from the list of nine allowed actions” represent implementations of the mechanism restricted actions, but they are different implementations of the same mechanism, not two new and different mechanisms.
Homework 2-C. Do a search for Eurogame rules. You may
own some games. You may find rules and reviews on the net. For each game, identify mechanisms found in the game rules. Were you able to identify mechanisms other than those I listed above, or presented in “Designing Modern Strategy Games”?
Homework 2-D “The pirate captain and her gang of merry
women find an uninhabited island full of zombies and vam-pires.” Turn that sentence into the two-paragraph back cover blurb on a paperback novel. It is entirely legitimate to go over the top in the description, mindful that I may read some of these out loud in class. Writing blurbs is important. Game blurbs are an equivalent to the two-paragraph elevator pitch.
Homework 2-E. Now write a two-page plot outline for a
novel corresponding to your cover blurb. To make things less painful for you, you will assume that your novel will be written in a single point of view, namely the point of view of the pirate captain.
Homework 2-F. If you have ever played a board wargame,
analyze its rules for items that could be general mechanisms found in other games. “Game is set in Tokyo” is a specific statement. “Geographically realistic map” might be a game
not write a line of dialog or word of description until they have every detail plotted out. To make life more interesting, there are people in the middle. These people believe in doing a skeletal written document that reads like a very short version of the novel and is later to be expanded upon. This technique is some-times called “progressive refinement.” A writing group with a mixture of these types may suffer from great unhappiness.
What sort of game are you designing? “What is the plot hook?” is usually not a fundamental element of the game’s de-sign. It’s like the abstract of a technical paper or the blurb on a dust jacket of a book. It’s important. It affects how the product is received. It’s there to persuade readers to be interested in buying the work. However, “What sort of game?” is really not a fundamental element of the game’s design. It’s like the cover of a paperback or a web site’s splash page. Having emphasized the difference between a game design and a game selling point, we turn to the next question.
Where do board wargames fit in this? Most fundamentally, board wargames are characterized by
their theme and their representation. The theme is warfare. The representation uses a stylized game map that supports quantized positioning of game markers. The game markers are small sec-tions of cardboard or similar material representing military units. The markers have printing on them, numbers and other symbols, representing each unit’s abilities. Within each topic, e.g., rules for movement, there are a great number of different options, but at a more abstract level wargame rules are obliged to have certain similarities. One can list a set of topics on which a game nearly certainly would be obliged to have rules, and a second set of topics on which a wargame might or might not have rules. These sets of topics define the style of the game, and are treated in later chapters. Board wargames vary consid-erably in their shape, but are somewhat more complex to far more complex and time-consuming than are most other types of board game. Some game designs make an effort to use first person singular, in which a player demonstrably corresponds to a single person in the historical army. With far more games, the voice is first person plural or third person plural.
As a practical matter, many readers of this volume are com-puter gamers. Others will have played a light wargame, in which the unit counters are small plastic figurines, and in which large numbers of dice are rolled and matched against simple rules, but light wargames are outside the scope of this book. We’re next going to discuss several design elements that are specific to wargames, but that would not be expected to arise in other sorts of game. We start with general qualitative variables. We then discuss historical epochs and game scales. Having
Westland Whirlwind
The Kommandeur 12
PUBLICATION DEADLINES Articles will be accepted at any time, though submission of an article does not guarantee its publication. News items will be accepted if received in sufficient time to allow production schedules to be met. Deadline for next issue: May 31, 2019.
GENERAL INFORMATION The Kommandeur (K) is the official newsletter of AHIKS, an international society of mature adults who play historical simulation games by email and mail. AHIKS is an organization of amateurs, staffed by volunteers, and is not affiliated with any game company or publisher. Society dues are yearly. Additional information about current rates is available from the Treasurer. We do not accept advertising. We do accept “ad trades” on an issue-for-issue basis with other publications and organizations. Direct inquiries to the Editor.
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Apr. 12-14, Manitou Springs, Colorado Pikes Peak Gamers Convention http://pikespeakgamers.com/ Apr. 13, Topeka, KS Topeka Games Day https://www.facebook.com/TopekaGamesDay/ Apr. 20, Cheyenne, Wyoming Cheyenne Gaming Convention http://www.cheyennegamingconvention.com/ May 3-5, Shepherdstown, West Virginia 1d4Con 2019 http://1d4con.com/ May 4-5, Tupelo, MS Tupelo Con 2019 https://www.tupelocon.org/ May 23-27, Alpharetta, GA Atlanta Game Fest 33 http://atlantagamefest.com/ May 24-26, Mobile, AL Mobicon 2019 http://mobilecomiccon.org/
May 31-June 2, Chattanooga, Tennessee LibertyCon https://libertycon.org/
June 12-16, Columbus, OH Origins 2019 http://originsgamefair.com/
June 22-29, Tempe, AZ CONSIMWORLD EXPO 2019 http://expo.consimworld.com/
July 12-14, Atlanta, Georgia Southern-Fried Gaming Expo http://southernfriedgameroomexpo.com/
July 13-19, Miami, Florida GACUCon Game Cruise https://www.gacucon.com/
July 20-28, Seven Springs Resort, PA World Boardgame Championships https://www.boardgamers.org/wbcindex.html
November 8-11, Cromwell, CT Compass Games Expo 2019 https://www.compassgames.com/preorders/expo2019.html A good source for information on all kinds of conventions is the Steve Jackson game site: http://sjgames.com/con
The Kommandeur 13
Jutland 1919 is a supplement for our Great War at Sea: Jutland game, studying these drawing-board battleships that would never actually be launched. It includes background es-says, thirty-one new scenarios, and 80 new silky-smooth die-cut playing pieces (60 double-sized "long" ship pieces and 20 square ones). It is not playable by itself; you’ll need Jutland and High Seas
Fleet book to play the scenarios. New pieces include three classes of German battleships de-
signed but never built: a fast battleship with eight 15-inch guns, a battleship with ten 15-inch guns in five turrets, with three of them in a unique triple-stacked arrangement. And an even lar-ger ship with 16.5-inch guns. There are two new classes of bat-tle cruiser, one with 15-inch guns, one with 16.5-inch guns. And two variations on the fast armored cruiser proposed after the Battle of Jutland, one with ten 8.2-inch guns, and one with twenty (20) 5.9-inch guns. Plus there are additional scout cruis-ers and destroyers. $30 http://www.avalanchepress.com/gameJutland1919.php
Second Great War at Sea: The Cruel Sea Our Second Great War alternative history story arc posits a world in which Woodrow Wilson’s attempts to forge a compromise peace in late 1916 succeeded. Millions of lives were saved and vast de-struction averted, while the great empires of Eastern Europe – Germany, Austria, Russia, and Turkey – survived for another generation. But not all accepted this new world order, and in August 1940 war returned to Europe.
The Cruel Sea is a truly massive expan-sion set for Second Great War at Sea. It fea-tures the ships, airships, helicopters, and airplanes of Imperial Germany, Republican France, and Imperial Russia.
The Cruel Sea is intended as the foundation of the Second Great War at Sea; other supplements, like Sword of the Sea, will draw on this set for playing pieces (which lets us put even more new toys in those sets rather than repeating the same pieces).
There are also thirty new scenarios based on the battles waged during the first eight months of this war that never hap-pened, in our popular story-arc format. This module is not play-able by itself, but requires ownership of Bismarck and Arctic Convoy to enjoy all of the scenarios. $100 http://www.avalanchepress.com/gameCruelSea.php
Panzer Grenadier: La Campagne de Tunisie In 1942, Allied forces invaded North Africa, while Axis troops marched in to resist them. The French Army of Africa fought against both of them. This is a thing that really happened.
In La Campagne de Tunisie, designer Philippe Léonard (1940: The Fall of France) tells this story in a series of 12 Pan-zer Grenadier scenarios, as the French fight the Americans, the Germans, the British, and the Italians (but not all at the same time). Initially resisting the American and British invaders, the French see things differently after the Germans toss aside the German-French Armistice of 1940 and occupy all of France. The French - including troops from Morocco, Algeria, and Tu-nisia – then fight against the Germans and Italians, providing a major component of the British First Army in northern Tunisia.
La Campagne de Tunisie includes 88 new playing pieces with some additional units for the German, American, British and Italian armies, but mostly the eclectic troops and weapons
Game News
Avalanche Press Panzer Grenadier: Africa Orientale Italiana In January
1941, British Empire forces began a two-pronged invasion of Italian East Africa, the fascist-ruled colonies on the Horn of Africa. Britain had known only defeat up until this moment, but after a grueling 11-month campaign the Empire had its first victory.
Africa Orientale Italiana is a complete Panzer Grenadier game based on these battles: the Italian conquest of Somaliland and British re-conquest, the campaign in Eritrea including the bloody Battle of Keren, the invasion of Somaliland and much more. There are 43 scenarios based on these battles, organized into six “battle games” that allow you to play the scenarios in sequence toward your army’s operational goals. $90 http://www.avalanchepress.com/gameOrientale.php
Second World War at Sea: Sea of Iron World War II began when the German battleship Schleswig-Holstein opened fire in the early morning hours of 1 September 1939. The war started on the Baltic Sea, and some of its very last actions took place there as well.
Sea of Iron is a complete Second World War at Sea boxed game based on actions on the Baltic Sea between 1939 and 1945. Thirty scenarios track the operations and battles that took place or could have taken place between the fleets and air forces of Germany, Poland, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, the So-viet Union, Finland, and Sweden. In addi-tion to their complete Baltic Sea orders of battle, the Soviets, Swedes, and Finns all have additional ships they planned or began to construct but did not complete.
There are 140 “long” ship pieces and 420 standard-sized square ones representing smaller warships, transports, aircraft (many, many aircraft), and a handful of markers. This is a big game, at least in terms of pieces. The map is not so big: the Baltic Sea is pretty small and almost completely land-locked, with ports and airfields in abundance. Aircraft are very potent in this theater, and ships have very little room to hide. The map by Guy Riessen shows the full Baltic on a single 11x17-inch panel. $80 http://www.avalanchepress.com/gameSeaofIron.php
Great War at Sea, Jutland 1919 Imperial Germany laid down her last dreadnought in January 1915, and never com-pleted her. But planning continued for new classes of battle-ships, battle cruisers, armored cruisers, and scout cruisers. All understood that they could not possibly be built during the course of the ongoing First World War but would be laid down afterwards.
Reflecting the lessons first of the battles of the Falklands, Coronel, and Helgoland Bight, and eventually those of Jutland, the new German designs continued to emphasize protection. At the urging of sea officers, the new ships also now carried arma-ment equal to that of the British and would make much higher speeds as well.
Across the North Sea, the British Admiralty had no clear idea of what the Germans might be planning to build, but could state with certainty that they and other potential enemies would continue to improve their warships. New British dreadnoughts would carry ever-more-powerful armaments, including a new, secret 18-inch gun.
The Kommandeur 14
of the Army of Africa. There are Moroccan Goumiers, tough mountain tribesmen from Morocco who love to fight but are just as interested in looting. Camel cavalry. Obsolescent limited-production French tanks. And for the first time in Panzer Grenadier, the French Foreign Legion. Plus you get a set of 12 scenarios.
La Campagne de Tunisie is a supplement for Panzer Grenadier: An Army at Dawn. It is not a complete game: ownership of An Army at Dawn and Conquest of is necessary to play all of the 12 scenarios included. La Campagne de Tu-nisie also includes 88 silky-smooth, die-cut-and-mounted play-ing pieces. $25 http://www.avalanchepress.com/gameTunisie.php
Canvas Temple Publishing Admiral’s War: World War II at Sea is a board game
recreation of the strategic naval situation in WWII, from the early months of the Atlantic war to the decisive Battle of the Philippine Sea in late 1944. Although all the major combat ships in the Axis and Allied navies are portrayed in the game, and although the board shows all the battle areas from the Bar-ents Sea to Samoa, AW is only a basic simulation of the war on a strategic level, with most of the tactical details represented by simple game mechanics. The resulting game is fast-paced and fun to play, but it is not as realistic as many other simulations.
Much of AW is derived from mechanics used in Avalon Hill's classic game Victory in The Pacific (VITP), applying a modified version of that system to the sea wars in both the At-lantic and the Pacific, essentially combining that title with its older brother War at Sea (WAS), which was published in turn by Jedko Games and Avalon Hill.
Players familiar with these older titles will immediately notice that the mapboard representing the Pacific is structurally similar to its predecessor (except for the western portion), whereas the map for the Atlantic theatre has changed radically. This was done for two main reasons:
1) to more seamlessly combine the mechanics of the two games
2) to better reflect the nature of the Atlantic naval fighting. The original WAS, for all its appeal, essentially recreates a Jutland-like scenario using a WW2 order of battle, something that never really happened. The Battle of the Atlantic from 1939-1944 was much more a game of hide & seek – or even whack-a-mole – than anything else. Also, the U boats that were so central to the real war were relegated in WAS to very much a supporting role. This game attempts to address those issues while still maintaining most of the original system's simplicity and minimizing special rules that apply to only one theatre or the other. The solution selected is to replace the patrol-only, one-or-two-area moves of WAS with the patrol-raid and up-to-three-area structure of VITP, but simultaneously dividing the Atlantic and Mediterranean into more areas. This combination satisfactorily restricts the range of the Axis ships, but at the same time gives them added options, thus presenting the Allied player with a far more complex blockade/anti-submarine prob-lem. $90/$120 https://canvastemple.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=1&products_id=4
Compass Games Stalin's World War III is a two game package: Volume 1
– Operation Pincher & The Soviet Offensive in Europe; Volume 2 – Operation Sandown & The Soviet Offensive in the Mid-East. This is an alternative history monster-size wargame, designed by Ty Bomba, intended to investigate the strategic parameters that would’ve been in place during the first 10 weeks of operations had that dictator lived long enough to put in motion one of his many plans to start a global conflict in 1953. Had he lived, the most likely start date would’ve been one coinciding with the signing of the Korean War armistice in July, in order to achieve maximum surprise. Each two-map volume can be played separately by one, two, three, or four players, or they can both be combined into a Grand Campaign Scenario covering all four maps.
His goal in starting such a war on the continent would’ve been to blitz across Western Europe all the way to Rome and France’s Atlantic and Mediterranean coasts. He would thereby have succeeded in an even grander operation than that of the Germans in 1940 and, in so doing, certified himself as history’s greatest military commander. He would likely also have tried to overrun Yugoslavia and eliminated Tito (whom Stalin loathed). His goal in opening a front in the Mid-East would’ve been to blitz all the way to Suez and the Persian Gulf oilfields. He would thereby have succeeded in denying the US Air Force the bases needed from which to launch its planned strategic “air atomic” offensive into the USSR, while also deny the West the petroleum resources of the region.
There are rules for atomic bombs, but their use by the Com-munists is constrained by their still limited availability histori-cally at that time, as well as by their lack of a fully dependable means to deliver them. On the US/UN/NATO side, the limita-tion is political. That is, the early 1950s marked the arrival of the anti-imperialist (a.k.a. “third world” or “nonaligned”) movement on the global media stage. So if the Americans try to win by using enough bombs to blow to bits Stalin’s horde, they do so much damage to the environmental and socio-political ecologies as to undo their victory in the strategic sense.
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Communist units of maneuver are Soviet divisions along with East European satellite and Mid-East nations’ corps and armies. On the US/UN/ATO side there are mostly divisions and a few corps, along with reinforcing US “regimental combat teams” and British “brigade groups.” Air power is abstracted, with counters and rules showing the effects of one side or the other gaining temporary air superiority. Each full turn repre-sents one week of ‘real time.’ $80 https://www.compassgames.com/preorders/stalin-s-world-war-iii.html
Vietnam: Rumor of War In 1965, the United States de-cided to intervene in the ongoing conflict in Vietnam. This mo-ment shaped the United States more than any other in the 20th Century. From the battlefield to the home front, the United States faced one of the greatest challenges in its history. Using the Operational Scale System as seen in Korea: Fire and Ice, OSS: Vietnam will show the conflict in a playable yet histori-cal manner.
Using at its heart, a blending of two older games, Road to the Rhine and A Victory Denied, players have the ability to move all their units once. However, they may choose to move those units in any of several impulses, if they can afford the supply cost to do so. The opposing player will have to maintain adequate reserves to counter this variable impulse movement.
The Operational Scale System (OSS) is meant to be a fast, accessible way of playing, and finishing, larger games. Finally playing a large “monster game” will no longer require hundreds of hours – now, you can easily complete a game of this size in a weekend. Players will activate HQs, fight off insurgents, bomb and disrupt the infrastructure of their opponents with the unique means available to each side. Whether by bombing raids or insurgents, how your side maintains the ability to wage war will be the key to victory. All the while, players must watch how their actions influence events far from the battlefield. $89 https://www.compassgames.com/preorders/vietnam-rumor-of-war.html
Zeppelin Raider: Imperial German Naval Airships is a
solitaire, tactical level game placing you in command of one of several models of WWI Zeppelin dirigibles as part of the Impe-rial German Navy. Your mission is to destroy as much English war facilities as possible via bombing raids, or to conduct re-connaissance over the North Sea...and still survive and come home. Zeppelin Raider is based on the popular Hunters game system by Gregory M. Smith.
"England shall be destroyed by fire!" – line from a popular German children's song, circa WW1.
So hoped Germany after the initial successes of World War 1 turn into a quagmire and stalemate in the trenches...and now, a new weapon arose, capable of crossing the channel with im-punity and bringing destruction to England. Count Ferdinand von Zeppelin's brainchild, the lighter-than-air rigid airship, came to the forefront of new weapons in this most brutal of wars. It took a certain amount of courage to go to war riding over a half million cubic feet of flammable gas, but there were no shortage of volunteers. Despite the arguable effectiveness of the world's first strategic bombing campaign, it without ques-tion tied up a huge amount of resources that England could barely afford, and for that reason alone was worthwhile. One hundred and seventy seven Zeppelin sorties pummeled England during the war, with high explosive and incendiary bombs, which caused a strong British response. The Zeppelins finally lost the arms race to aircraft and explosive/incendiary bullets, however, and losses were grievous. Over half of the German airships were lost on combat missions, most of those in flames.
Players will find it challenging to survive an entire tour from 1914 to 1918, at which time, if still alive, you will surren-der at base, having done your part on the front lines. If desired, a player may start with a more advanced model of Zeppelin which may actually increase their chances to survive. You may start at any month/year you wish, but notice that some Zeppe-lins are available right away, but others are not available until later. Players may be reassigned to a newer model of Zeppelin under some circumstances, but typically will stay in the same airship until the end of game or until shot down in flames, sunk, or wrecked in a crash landing.
The object of the game is to conduct numerous missions which include two main types: Bombing missions are required to bomb a specific geographic location in England (London, for example), whereas Scouting missions are required to scout a specific location in the North Sea. Players are not limited by the mission parameters for success; as you may choose to bomb or successfully scout somewhere else. The success of each mission can result in promotion and crew advancement. Just as in the real war, the game system involves a great deal of chance (as was the case historically), but ultimate success rests on the deci-sions, you make during your career.
A strong historical narrative is presented without overly cumbersome or complex rules to memorize so the focus is al-ways on game play and what critical decisions you will make during each mission. Rules cover mission selection, altitude adjustment and gas cell tracking, venting, emergency jettison, maximum altitude, dynamic lift, wind and weather effects, fuel management, bombing missions, aircraft and ship encounters, zeppelin damage, crew advancement, awards and promotion, reassignment to a newer ship, a special resupply mission to Africa, and much more! $69 https://www.compassgames.com/preorders/zeppelin-raider-imperial-german-naval-airships.html
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Conflict Simulations 1987: On to Kaliningrad! is a hypothetical game on WW3
based on the original objectives of the 1914 invasion of East Prussia, on the 70th anniversary of the Soviet Union. The order of battle for both sides is drawn from records from the 80s, and the tactical situation is complex given the absence of major NATO ground forces such as the US, France, England etc. 1987 uses the same rules as 1950 with several changes in both scale and mechanics to reflect the tactical situation.
1987 includes rules for tactical nuclear strikes, refugees, political objectives airmobile units, and more. Admittedly, there is little historical basis for this tactical situation given Kalinin-grad came under Soviet control after WW2 and the major play-ers in NATO were ready at a moment’s notice to cooperate, as they did during the Balkan wars of the 90s. This situation is only possible if we assume that the major member nations of NATO have isolated themselves and are reluctant to commit. £40 https://www.secondchancegames.com/index.php/pre-orders/1987-on-to-kaliningrad-detail
1968: Tet The 4th title in the Procedural Combat Series (PCS) allows players to recreate the infamous Vietnamese Tet Offensive across Vietnam. PCS is uniquely suited to simulate the conflict given the variable combat strength system being an elegant way of representing asymmetric and conventional war-fare on a number of levels.
1968 is arguably the first game in the series to give a player a significant chance of winning through an Automatic Victory. The Vietnamese player is incentivized to string a series of rope-a-dope attacks together forcing the American player to con-stantly react or recover instead of operating offensively. The American player while having advanced weaponry, fantastic air power and well trained units, they lack strategic objectivity making it more difficult to turn success into political conse-quence/VP.
Random events can play a key role in switching the chang-ing the pacing of the game; like ending a turn prematurely, al-lowing several spent units to refresh or even exchange combat chits. The Vietnamese player receives material support through the USSR and nuances regarding supply/logistics allow the Vietnamese player a level of strategic and operational flexibil-ity unavailable to the American units, at the exchange of raw power. $40 https://www.consimsltd.com/shop/1968-tet-pre-order
Critical Hit Berlin Final Victory, huge monster edition: Crazy, big,
massive, enlarged, and unprecedented. Those would be terms one could use to describe the Battle of Berlin. You might also want to trot them out for a description of this new edition of Berlin I, an unusual and unique gaming experience—the first truly large hex city fight. What you get is an enlarged game map using the new lay-flat, hard boards. It's just mind-blowing to look at, the expanse. You also receive the scenario collection in latest editions in color plus new color rules pages. Bring your own counters from any edition or purchase the "Berlin counter set" now available. You also get the collection of color play aids in new cardstock format for durability and ease of use.
What you receive with each copy: A full set of 15 Berlin I scenarios in color format All new map board set Color 3-hole punch version of the latest edition of the rules Reichstag Play Aid on card in color $100
http://www.criticalhit.com/mm5/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Product_Code=ASLBER1MON
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Dan Verssen Games Warfighter Pacific Core Game is a card game for 1 to 6
players. You play cooperatively with your friends against the system to complete World War II squad-level combat missions. The core game gives you a full team of US Marines and a full set of Japanese Hostiles. Each Expansion then adds to these sets.
This includes the soldiers, weapons, equipment, and tactics used by each of those nations. Everything you need to create your own unique squad of soldiers! $60 https://www.mcssl.com/store/danverssengames/warfighter-pacific-core-game
Decision Games Rogers' Rangers: America's First Commandos The
French and Indian War (1754-1763) was raging along the fron-tier of Britain’s North American colonies. American colonists fighting alongside the British regulars developed a new form of soldier. The Ranger was at home with the irregular war-fare dominating the contest for upper New York and the St. Lawrence Valley.
This solitaire game is part of the Raider game system. You command Ranger forces conducting missions as directed by strategy cards. You recruit leaders like Robert Rogers, and units including historical Ranger companies and British light infan-try, then purchase weapons and tools to equip them. Each expe-dition leads you along trails and rivers to engage French and Indian forces generated by the game system.
Event cards bring in a wide range of actions, from the mobi-lization of enemy forces to wilderness challenges. You must overcome all of them to reach your objectives. $15 https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/255642/rogers-rangers-americas-first-commandos?utm_source=BoardGameGeek%20Newsletter&utm_campaign=9c273ac457-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2018_01_25_COPY_01&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_23873ccd5d-9c273ac457-99234077&mc_cid=9c273ac457&mc_eid=0cd38aa307
Vikings: Scourge of the North. Europe in the last centuries of the Dark Age was beset by Scandinavian raiders. Their long-ships sailed the high seas, reaching lands as far as the Volga and North America. While mainly known for their pillaging, the Vikings were also explorers, traders, and colonists.
This is a solitaire game. You lead a band of warriors with their ships and weapons. Units represent historical Viking lead-ers such as Leif Erikson and Harald Hardrada. You can recruit elite huskarls and fanatic berserkers, and build more longships. You are in pursuit of gold, glory, and new lands to settle on a
map running from Russia to Vinland, from Scandinavia to the fabled lands of the Byzantine Empire.
Saga cards send you on four different voyages of discovery and quest fulfillment. Voyage cards bring in special actions such as forming a shield wall in combat and ending the game with a Viking funeral. $15 https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/255640/vikings-scourge-north?utm_source=BoardGameGeek%20Newsletter&utm_campaign=9c273ac457-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2018_01_25_COPY_01&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_23873ccd5d-9c273ac457-99234077&mc_cid=9c273ac457&mc_eid=0cd38aa307
Operation Typhoon is a solitaire operational-strategic simulation that covers the final advance toward Moscow of Germany’s Army Group Center late in 1941. The player ac-tively commands the German forces, while the rules system directs you in the handling of Soviet forces. The system allows the player to plan and execute his advance towards Moscow with the Soviet defending forces being randomly created in each hex dependent on the terrain. You win or lose, ultimately, based on the timely seizure of key areas on the map. Each game turn equals one or two weeks.
Though designed for solitaire play, Operation Typhoon is easily adaptable to cooperative team play. One person can ad-ministratively handle the Soviets while the other actively com-mands the German force. Alternatively, one player can com-mand the three northern German armies and panzer groups while the other commands the three southern formations. The game map represents the terrain in the operational area of Mos-cow, with each unit representing the historical German divi-sions and randomly generated Soviet defending forces. $29 https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/235989/operation-typhoon?utm_source=BoardGameGeek%20Newsletter&utm_campaign=ffdc05e2b5-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2018_01_25_COPY_01&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_23873ccd5d-ffdc05e2b5-99234077&mc_cid=ffdc05e2b5&mc_eid=0cd38aa307
Hawaii, 1795: Kamehameha's War of Unification Skir-mishes, raids, and abortive diplomacy had divided the Hawaiian Islands from one another. In 1795, Kamehameha unified the big island of Hawaii and set out to bring the other islands under one high king.
This is a two-player game of Kamehameha’s campaign of unification. One player controls the forces of Kamehameha, the other commands the allied chiefs of Oahu and Maui. Movement carries armies along the Hawaiian chain, followed by tactical
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that are available for purchase alongside the existing cards. Explore new strategies and card combinations to seek new ways of building your dynasty's Legacy.
New Emperor Rules—During the Third Century, Emperors didn't only sit on the throne in Rome; they ruled from the provinces and commanded armies in the field, where they were at risk of being killed in battle or assassinated. These optional rules place Emperors directly on the board in place of a Gover-nor or General token. Bold use of your Emperor will grant you bonuses, but if the Emperor token should be removed from the board, your reign is at an end.
AI Players—New optional rules for non-player factions driven by easy-to-use "artificial intelligence" instructions will allow 2 or 3 players and even solo players to enjoy a full 4-faction game. Three different AI Player profiles can fill your empty seats to provide a mix of challenges working against the human players' Imperial aspirations. $25 https://www.gmtgames.com/p-698-the-age-of-iron-and-rust-a-time-of-crisis-expansion.aspx
Battle Line, Medieval Edition takes about 30 minutes to play. To win, you must create powerful formations along your side of the line of battle that are superior to those of your en-emy. Victory goes to the player who wins 5 of the 9 battle flags (an envelopment) or three adjacent flags (a breakthrough). Based on Reiner Knizia's original design published in Germany as Shotten-Totten, Battle Line enhances and expands that game system to give players even more tactical options and decisions.
Battle Line places you in command of your army's strate-gies. How will you muster your formations? Will you use your powerful KingsGuard to vanquish your enemy, or perhaps send the King of England or France to the front to win a critical flag? Or perhaps you'll rely on your spies to determine the en-emy's strengths and weaknesses before committing your best forces. You'll always have plenty of choices. With every card play, you'll determine the strength and direction of your attack while plotting to fend off your enemy's advances. $16/$24 https://www.gmtgames.com/p-741-battle-line-medieval-themed-edition.aspx
combat for control of each island. Counters represent warriors, musketeers, pikemen, elite guards, cannons, and canoes.
The game mechanics are based on the Ancient Wars system. Cards generate special events, such as intervention by the forces of Kauai, the acquisition of cannons from European powers, or granting one player tactical advantages or additional forces. $12 https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/255341/hawaii-1795-kamehamehas-war-unification?utm_source=BoardGameGeek%20Newsletter&utm_campaign=ffdc05e2b5-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2018_01_25_COPY_01&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_23873ccd5d-ffdc05e2b5-99234077&mc_cid=ffdc05e2b5&mc_eid=0cd38aa307
Flying Pig Games Ghost Front is the second expansion to Old School Tactical
Vol II, covering the German's Ardennes offensive of 1944. This boxed expansion includes a new, 30" x 41" mounted map board depicting snowy Ardennes terrain, a new sheet of counters with new SS and American units, unit data cards, and an 11-scenario booklet. You must own Old School Tactical Volume II to play Ghost Front. $45 https://flyingpiggames.com/products/ghost-front,
Platoon Commander Deluxe: Kursk $100/$80 https://flyingpiggames.com/products/platoon-commander-deluxe-kursk
GMT Games
The Age of Iron and Rust: A Time of Crisis Expansion is the game that allows 2-4 players to re-create the Roman Crisis of the Third Century, leading separate dynasties in a struggle for control of an empire beset by threats both internal and exter-nal. The Age of Iron and Rust provides new choices for play-ers to build their influence, exert their Imperial power, and even play alone.
New Influence Cards—Deckbuilding is a key aspect of Time of Crisis, and the means by which players grow their influence among the Senate, the Legions, and the People of Rome throughout the game. While the base game provides an array of cards for players to choose from, The Age of Iron and Rust doubles the number of choices with a full new set of cards
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http://www.hfdgames.com/loc3.html
High Flying Dice Games Hell in the Holy Land: The First and Second Battles for
Gaza is a wargame simulation of the first major offensives by Allied forces in Palestine during World War I.
Following defeats along the Suez Canal the Ottoman gov-ernment forcibly evacuated the civilians of Gaza and began fortifying the town and nearby high ground. The Allied forces occupied the Sinai but could only slowly build up forces for a sustained offensive, and only after extensive work was com-pleted on rail lines and water pipeline from Egypt. In the spring of 1917 this work was completed, and both sides prepared for a fight. In the meantime the Ottoman Empire had won significant victories over the Allies at the Gallipoli peninsula, and in Iraq where a British and Indian army were compelled to surrender after a grueling siege.
The Allies brought to Gaza hundreds of artillery, the largest concentration of this weaponry outside of the Western Front, including gas chemical shells, as well as tanks. The Ottomans had also rushed reinforcements, including veterans who were at Gallipoli, German advisors, and aircraft. $21 http://www.hfdgames.com/hellinholyland.html
Land of Confusion 3 If the “balloon had gone up” in Cold War Europe during the 1980s, another of the hotter spots of that hell would have been the Hof Gap. NATO’s US Seventh Corps and West German forces would be outnumbered by Soviet and East German forces coming from the north, as well as others from the east out of Czechoslovakia.
The NATO forces, however, would be defending in terrain that was well suited for defense. A key element for Soviet suc-cess would be the quick capture of Nuremburg, where key roads intersected.
If the Warsaw Pact and Soviet forces hoped to take West Germany and drive to the Rhine, their forces would have to move quickly and ruthlessly through this part of southern West Germany.
This game came about at the request of my good friend and ace play tester, Brian Brennan. During the early 80s Brian was a military policeman in intelligence operations, attached to the 11th Armored Cavalry. He was stationed in the Fulda Gap re-gion. While play testing other games with this design he re-quested that I make a game on a possible “what if” battle for Fulda Gap; what you have now before is the result. $15 http://www.hfdgames.com/loc3.html
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http://www.hfdgames.com/pt109.html $50 http://www.hfdgames.com/undeniable.html
Hollandspiele Table Battles Expansion No. 3: Gettysburg This third
expansion to the popular Table Battles series [you need "Table Battles" to play this game] focuses its attention on a single day: 2 July 1863, the second day of the Battle of Gettysburg. Fa-mous engagements from throughout the attack each get their own scenario, while a final scenario zooms out for a "big pic-ture" view of the whole thing.
These battles were hard-fought, stubborn, and bloody af-fairs, often without any decisive result, ending only when both sides were too exhausted to fight any further. That's reflected here, and so it's significantly harder to get a decisive result, and you're more likely to see epic slugfests in which you win only because the other side collapsed an eye-blink sooner.
The six scenarios in this set are: Little Round Top The Wheatfield The Peach Orchard Cemetery Ridge Culp's Hill The Second Day $20
https://hollandspiele.com/products/table-battles-expansion-no-3-gettysburg
Brave Little Belgium recreates this dramatic early cam-paign of the First World War in a lightning-quick introductory wargame with plenty of challenges for both sides. As the Ger-man Player, you must smash through the enemy’s defenses as quickly as possible, relentlessly advancing. But push your men too hard, and they might commit atrocities that will rally world opinion against you. As the Entente Player, you must stage a desperate defense against overwhelming odds. When and where to fall back, and where to take a stand, are decisions of vital importance.
Combat is fast and streamlined, while a clever take on chit-pull activations creates moments of tension and uncertainty. The result is an engaging wargame for new recruits and grog-nards alike from first-time design-ers and longtime friends Ryan Heil-man and Dave Shaw. $40 https://hollandspiele.com/products/brave-little-belgium
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The Heights of Alma Tom Russell's first published game was Blood in the Alma. That humble little magazine insert game, published in 2012, introduced concepts that over time gave birth to Hollandspiele's Blood in the Fog and, even-tually, the Shot & Shell Battle Series. So it is perhaps fitting that seven years and nearly forty published designs later, Mr. Russell would turn his attention back to the topic that started it all, redesigned from the ground-up through the lens of the Shot & Shell system. The result is The Heights of Alma.
The heights overlooking the Alma River provided a natural defensive advantage for the Russians, who proceeded to utterly squander it with slapdash entrenchments and a left flank that was completely exposed. It didn't help that the commander of that left wing was several sheets to the wind. At least he was on the field; on the opposing side, British commander Lord Raglan snuck behind enemy lines for a better view of the battle without telling his subordinates, leaving his army without any orders. Frontal charges against the Russian heavy guns were as costly as they were pointless. Eventually, a group of men disobeyed orders, choosing to stand and fire instead—discovering, to their delight, that their new Minié rifles outranged the enemy artil-lery! They would have known that from the beginning if any-one had bothered to listen to their French allies—the only side to acquit themselves competently.
The historical scenario recreates this glorious mess of a battle. Three additional scenarios ex-plore increasing levels of coordination and compe-tence on either side. This game has more special rules than the previous Shot & Shell title (Seven Pines; or, Fair Oaks), resulting in a more complex and nuanced experience, but not so many rules that it bogs the thing down. A given scenario will still be resolved within a couple of hours. $50 https://hollandspiele.com/products/the-heights-of-alma
Legion Wargames Ici c'est la France! - 2nd Edition, The Algerian War of
Independence 1954 - 1962 This game covers the French insur-gency war against the FLN in Algeria during 1954-62. It is a conflict of great drama. It cost the lives of at least half a mil-lion Algerians, it brought the tumultuous exodus of one million French settlers from Algeria, and it brought France itself to the brink of civil war. There are three distinct factions of this simu-lation, Political, Insurgency, and Military, which are brilliantly interwoven such that it is the balance of these three factions that is the key to victory. One player is the FLN who will have units of three qualities, Moussebilines, Moudjahidines, and Zonal Commandos. The other player is France who will have both regular and elite regiments of Infantry, Mechanized, Paratroop, and Foreign Legion troops. $45 https://www.legionwargames.com/legion_ICI.html?mc_cid=a689423370&mc_eid=829d02ffba
Hill of Doves: The First Anglo-Boer War 1880-1881 is a solitaire boardgame in which the player controls an Imperial British Army at war with a programmed non-player, the Trans-vaal Republican Army, in 1881. The British army’s aim is to win the war by controlling the area known as Laing’s Nek which lies on the border between Natal and the Transvaal. The
British army has up to twelve weeks to achieve this, failing which, the Boers will win the war.
Hill of Doves is played at a strategic, operational, and tacti-cal level simultaneously. There are three phases to the game which are detailed on the Sequence of Play Cards. The Opera-tional Phase is the heart of the game and represents a seven-day cycle, with a Strategic Phase being referred to at the end of each Operational Phase to resolve situations occurring during the week just passed and a Tactical Phase representing a vari-able number of hours being referred to each time the British carry out an assault.
Hill of Doves is played using a programmed system whereby the player follows the instructions on the Sequence of Play cards aided by the step marker and the Set-up Card. If any battles are to be fought the player will be referred to the Tacti-cal Deck or the Ambush Deck to resolve the battle and then the player will be prompted to return to the Operational Deck to continue the war. $52.00: https://www.legionwargames.com/legion_HDV.html
Your editor purchased this game about 5 years ago from Godfrey Bailey, ©2010. It looked like an interesting
game, but I never took the time to get into it, even though it is a solitaire game. Might be worth a real look.
Lock 'n Load Bastogne is the companion module to Ride of the Val-
kyries and covers all the major operations of the German 5th Panzer Army and 7th Army during the Battle of the Bulge, 1944-45. Relive the desperate American delaying actions along the Bastogne corridor or the colossal tank battles between the 2nd Panzer Division and the US 2nd Armored Division in front of the Meuse near Dinant. Contains 12 scenarios. $30 Command Ops 2 is required to use this product. https://store.lnlpublishing.com/command-ops-2-vol-4-bastogne
Matrix Games Strategic Command WWII: World At War is your chance to re-fight the 20th century’s greatest conflict, from Poland to China, Normandy to the Pacific, on a map encompassing the globe.
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Building on the success of Strategic Command WWII: War in Europe, this new turn-based game will provide even more opportunities to try out different strategies. Can Germany, Italy and Japan triumph and construct their new world order, or will triumph turn to disaster as the rest of the world mobilizes to meet force with force?
New Features! From limited naval repairs to Kamikazes. Take command of the Axis or Allies, and re-fight the whole
of WWII! Let the computer take control of some of your allies so you
can concentrate on your favorite theaters. Play on a top-down hex based map spanning the entire
globe. A realistic Fog of War simulates the historical atmosphere
where you have to make decisions with only partial knowledge of your opponent's intentions and dispositions.
Play with a choice of 3-D unit graphics, or NATO counters if you prefer a more traditional wargaming experience
Research and upgrade your units with a unique level of choices! Infantry weapons, rockets, anti-submarine warfare, amphibious warfare, and more!
Use diplomacy to win over new allies and use your intelli-gence to undermine the enemy!
Contains a large number of strategic level Decision Events for you to choose your path to victory.
Very easy to use Editor to make your own “what-if” scenar-ios or create new maps and campaigns from scratch. $40 http://www.matrixgames.com/products/777/details/Strategic.Command.WWII.World.at.War
One Small Step Arc of the Kaiser's Last Raider (Last Raider for short)
puts you in the position of a writer of pulp fiction during the 1920s in which you are trying to complete an adventure fiction novel set some time during World War I on the high seas. You, the writer, are trying to construct a story arc in which the narra-tor of your novel, the commander of a German high seas raider in 1917, is trying to find a lost secret somewhere in the South Seas which, if he can return it to a port in Europe, will change the course of the World War raging in Europe. This objective is represented by an Objective card.
Along the way, your commander must face many perils, from shark infested waters to monolith haunted lost islands to Uber-Nemeses who will do anything to stop him from complet-ing his mission. These are represented by various Plot Cards.
But you have many ways to complete your mission (i.e., finish the book on deadline). One of these is the mighty Cliche, cards which you can hold and play at critical moments when all seems lost. However, the more Cliche cards you play, the greater the chance you have of losing the reader's suspension of disbelief, quantified as The Plot Thins Index. When you reach
your Objective, you must use your Savvy and trusty crew to overcome the final obstacles, grab the prize, and then return home. $45 http://ossgamescart.com/index.php?main_page =product_info&cPath=20&products_id=106
Operational Studies Group (OSG)
Napoleon Retreats After dispatching Blücher’s Army of Silesia at Vauchamps, Napoleon diverted temporarily toward the Seine at Montereau, for an inconclusive brush with Schwar-zenberg’s Army of Bohemia. His inveterate foe, Blücher, ap-parently had learned no lessons and threatened to move again on Paris. By March 3rd Napoleon was returning northward along the bank of the Ourcq River. The fall of Soissons, cheaply surrendered by General Moreau, saw the quarry escape over the Aisne River to link-up with 43,000 reinforcements near Laon, raising his strength to over 100,000. While the Em-peror concentrated between Fismes and Berry au Bac, Blücher continued to retreat on Laon. Reaching Craonne, the Emperor decided to advance along the chemin des dames to test Blücher’s position on the plateau, and clear the flank of his ad-vance on Laon.
The game covers the Campaign in France, Part II: 6 March to 13 March 1814. The major battle was Laon, on 9-10 March, when Napoleon, with 37,000, went up against Blücher's posi-tion, on the hill of Laon, with 85,000. (Marshal Marmont with a separate VI Corps was supposed to support the attack, but he was dispersed in a night combat.) Blücher wasn't feeling well and failed to pursue. One more battle was to follow (after two days for R&R) and Napoleon won that battle: Reims, against St. Priest. So actually, he won two out of three. $89 https://www.nobleknight.com/P/2147746673/Napoleon-Retreats
The Roads to Hal, Expansion Kit for Napoleon's Last Gamble This expansion kit adds one 22x34 map (WX) to the battlefield area and will extend from Brussels to west of Hal, overlapping the (N) and (NX) maps. And a 4-page study folder with three scenarios:
Expanded Waterloo Scenario: June 18th. Allows Napoleon the option of flanking the Mont St Jean position at the risk of freeing up the 17,000-man Hal force.
The Fields of Hal Scenario: June 17th - 18th. Hypothetical battle in the Hal environs. Can Blucher affect the outcome? Wellington believed that this area was the most likely location for the culminating battle, rather than Mont St Jean. Extended Campaign Scenario: June 15th - 19th. Provides Napo-leon and Wellington more operational options, with more areas to defend, more room for maneuver (and for error). In addition, several Turn Record Charts and Anglo-Allied Setup Cards will be provided to account for the added map and asso-
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ciated arrival times on the WX map. No additional counters will be needed. $21 https://www.nobleknight.com/P/2147746675/Roads-to-Hal-The
Revolution Games Counter-Attack: The Battle of Arras, 1940 is a two-
player game simulating the British and French attack on mobile German elements near Arras, France, on May 21, 1940. $30 http://www.revolutiongames.us/
Tiny Battle Publishing Tango Down is a tense game of modern house-clearing
operations, with scenarios taken from both the headlines and the movies. Hostage rescue, daring escapes, desperate last stands, ticking time bombs and more! Each player controls one or more fire teams, with each member having a counter and specific stats, augmented by Action cards that cover the fog of war, special tactics and event timing. Leaders, marksmen, fa-natics, barricades, assault shields, breaching charges.
Tango Down includes full color rules, seventy double-sided 1” counters, two 11 x 17 maps and 18 Action cards. In addition to the ten included scenarios, units have a point system so you can choose your own forces, and the map system allows you to adapt virtually any architectural drawing into a Tango Down battleground. $29 https://tinybattlepublishing.com/products/tango-down
Platoon Commander: Korea 1950 There's no tactical game on the market quite like Mark H. Walker's Platoon Com-mander. Color-coded range values abstract weapon capabili-ties, allowing you to focus on making things go boom. Back-
and-forth fire give you the dynamic impression of a fast-paced firefight. It's card-assisted, not card-driven, injecting a nice dose of chaos into the mix without ever devolving into the "why can't I get a fire card?" trap. The result is a fast paced and easy-to-play system in the service of tense, taut scenarios that are decided in the final turn
The first historical Platoon Commander module delves into the dynamic early days of the Korean War. The North Ko-rean People's Army (NKPA) is relentlessly marching south, and the United States Army, vastly outnumbered, finds itself fight-ing a series of desperate battles in an attempt to buy enough time for the Pusan Perimeter to be finished. Chaffees and T-34s, Skyraiders and guerilla attacks; it's all here. $10/$28 https://tinybattlepublishing.com/products/platoon-commander-korea-1950
Race to the Sea 1914 As you probably guessed from the title, Race to the Sea takes place in the early days of World War I. Players control corps-sized units in the Allied and Ger-man armies in Western Europe as they attempt to out-maneuver their enemies in a last-ditch effort to win the war and be home by Christmas. Hermann’s dynamic and unique rules set features a diceless, card-based combat system (originally introduced in Dead Reckoning) that oozes narrative and tension with quick resolution and gameplay. The result is an exciting simulation of the last mobile campaign on the western front fought in World War I. $25 https://www.nobleknight.com/P/2147746103/Race-to-the-Sea-1914
In the Trenches: Devil Dogs 2 - Faith and Sacrifice Re-live some of the major Marine battles fought after The Battle of Belleau Wood. This expansion covers four additional engage-ments, each with two "What if" alternatives, in the long and storied history of the United States Marine Corps and the sacri-fices they made. The Marines were involved in retaking towns, breaking heavy German defenses, and holding the line at a farm that stopped the German advance on Paris.
In the Trenches (ITT) system makes its return and expands on the battles of the US Marines with four hard fought scenar-ios drawn from Devil Dog history, and designed by Jim Sny-der. The In the Trenches series enables players to game his-torically accurate simulations of tactical operations from the Great War. ITT challenges players to move and fight with com-pany-level formations made of separate platoon-sized units during five-minute, impulse-based turns.
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NOTE: This is an expansion to the original Devil Dogs ITT game. You need that for game rules, the Player Aid Card, and some counters in order to play these new scenarios and alter-nates. Each of the four operations comes with two alternate setups for more action on your table. $29 https://tinybattlepublishing.com/products/in-the-trenches-devil-dogs-2
The Battle for Ramadi is a solitaire game that depicts the climatic seven days of the assault on this key town. You are the commander of the Iraqi Security Forces, and must capture the Government Complex to secure the political victory, but your ultimate objective is to liberate the city and its inhabitants. You have elite Counter Terrorism Service troops supported by army, police, and militia units. Combat is brutal and unpredictable. The city is full of IEDs, ISIS fighters, and innocent civilians. You can also call on Coalition air assets and special forces to give you the edge. $26 https://www.nobleknight.com/P/2147746058/Battle-for-Ramadi-The
Strategemata Hill 262—Chambois, 19 - 21 August 1944 presents the
Allied fights during closing the Falaise Pocket. The main hero is the 1st Armored Division of general Stanisław Maczek. In addition, there are American and Canadian units. There are 6 scenarios in the game. 4 of them are short clashes to familiarize yourself with the procedures of the system "Great Battles of Small Units". The main subject is the defense of the Allies and German attempts to get out of the pocket. The cha-otic organization of the German army in this battle is shown in a simple way. At the beginning of the game a German player chooses battle groups that he will try to move out of the board. The Allied player does not know the opponent's plans. Only during the game it turns out which units appear in the game. Thanks to that, every gameplay is different and the game pro-vides a lot of emotions.
Important: Game doesn`t include a deck of cards, which players have to supply themselves. $45 http://strategemata.pl/en/24-hill-262-chambois-1944.html
Tiny Battle Publishing Cruel Morning: Shiloh 1862 On April 5, 1862 the Con-
federacy appeared to be finished. Forts Henry and Donelson had fallen and a Confederate division had been routed at Mill Springs. The Rebels had lost Columbus, Clarksville, and Nash-ville. New Orleans and Memphis were under direct threat. Out west the invasion of New Mexico had failed and the Union had triumphed at Pea Ridge. Forts and ports along the seaboard were being captured or raided. In Virginia, George McClellan had at last started his great drive to capture Richmond. On the banks of the Tennessee River a complacent Union army rested and waited for reinforcements before beginning what some thought would be the final drive to end the rebellion.
On the morning of April 6 the Confederates attacked that complacent army near Shiloh Church. For two days the biggest battle yet waged by Americans was fought, a battle as large and savage as anything fought by Napoleon. In the end the Union triumphed, but at heavy cost. Ulysses S. Grant was for a time sidelined and Union generals became cautious for months after. Most of all, Shiloh changed the Civil War. Combined with Robert E. Lee’s successful defense of Richmond, Shiloh killed the vain dream of a quick war with conservative ends. The American Civil War became a long contest of wills, ending in the destruction of slavery and economic ruin for the American South. Shiloh, the country’s first truly bloody battle, continues to fascinate and enthrall historians and gamers.
Cruel Morning: Shiloh 1862 is a brigade grand tactical system that combines old school hex and counter maneuvers with rules for command and control, leader personalities, and a CRT that favors quality and firepower over raw mass. Shiloh features rules for the 47th Tennessee, Lew Wallace’s variable
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arrival, and Union gunboats, among other things. The game comes with 6 scenarios, including a better Confederate attack plan, the battle starting on April 5, and the second day of battle. In addition, rules are included to modify each scenario with a variable arrival for Don Carlos Buell’s Army of the Ohio and part of the Fort Donelson garrison escaping and taking part in the battle. $25 https://tinybattlepublishing.com/products/cruel-morning-shiloh-1862
Up & Away Games Athens: The Birth of Politics Struggle with Persians,
Spartans, and your own people on the way to a great empire! You can even change the form of government, changing the rules of the game!
Athens: The Birth of Politics reflects the most glorious, critical century in the life of ancient Athens, from the birth of Democracy to the titanic struggle with Sparta. Players cooperate and compete to manage its fortunes, especially its politics, wars, and government.
In this game you must constantly balance personal advance-ment against the security of the state. Trade and fight to build up the empire. Vie for power in the Assembly and on the battle-field. But to grow in size and power only attracts the unwelcome attention of rivals, not just your opponents, but also foreign powers like Persia, Syracuse, Thebes, and most deadly of all, Sparta.
Don't like your government type? Change it! In a unique feature the game reflects the ancient Greek the-
ory of Anacyclosis – the cycles of government – and includes Democracy, Oligarchy, and Tyranny. Players can strive to change these forms, for their own advantage, and thereby alter the very rules of the game.
When the government type changes, those on the top and bottom tend to change places. Can you see the change coming? How do you prepare for it? Or will you be the one actually trig-gering it? Once the change happens, how do you cope? All make for interesting challenges.
Each player represents a specific class – Aristocrats, Mer-chants, or Farmers – with its own Statesmen, (dis)advantages and goals.
Aristocrats have the most Statesmen, several of them gener-als with great ability, but face declining revenues and so may conspire to subvert Democracy and set up an Oligarchy. Mer-chants have the best revenue potential and benefit from Democ-racy, but talented Statesmen are rarer. Farmers have good poten-tial revenue, though often endangered by war, but have some of the best Orators, including Pericles and Themistocles. Often there is another player of your class with whom you can ally,
but at times you will come into conflict with them as well and find yourself allying with other classes. Consequently, no class has an unbalancing advantage. $80 http://upandawaygames.com/Athens/
White Dog Games The White Tribe is a strategic solitaire (one player) game
on the 1966-1980 civil war in the African nation of Rhodesia (today called Zimbabwe). Published by White Dog Games and designed by R. Ben Madison, it is the second game in Ben Madison’s Cold War Trilogy series. The player plays the forces of the White minority government (and its Portuguese and South African allies) against the “ZANU” and “ZAPU” guer-rilla forces which eventually won the war with Chinese and Soviet aid. The game focuses on domestic and international politics as much as it does on the military conflict itself. Players should be aware that they are a tiny country fighting a war in a world beyond their control.
It’s not a detailed historical simulation but is designed as a fun, challenging game that illustrates the general strategic course of the conflict and highlights important historical themes.
The White Tribe is a unique solitaire game with military and political aspects. You play the White government of Rho-desia, besieged by a Black guerrilla army, using your potent armed forces to hold it back while you try to persuade your colonialist voters to compromise and move to a system of Black majority rule. The balance of military and political factors makes for an intriguing and very different sort of game; you'll fight guerrillas, fight elections, and even pass bills with the same level of tension! Advancing generous policy positions, to win over African public opinion, can endanger you with the European voters you depend on for power. At the same time, you have to persuade foreign states that your reforms are mov-ing forward—they have different visions for Rhodesia than you do, and they can bring you down with economic sanctions or military strikes. And looming over you are the unstable Portu-guese, whose empire in Mozambique is vital to your strategic safety! Your aim is to build a government based on justice and equality, while holding off extremists on every side using all your military and political tools. $52 http://www.whitedoggames.com/thewhitetribe
Worthington Publishing
Freeman's Farm: 1777 is an Old School War Game with an Old School look. Military style map with military forma-tions and a vintage layout.
An innovative card driven board game on the Battle of Free-man's Farm. 1 - 2 players. Playable in 1 hour.
Freeman's Farm: 1777 is the first game in our new Battle Formations game series. These games are a new game system centered around battle formations and have been designed for solitaire and two players. In solitaire mode, players can play as either the American or the British against the solitaire player game engine.
Players decide which formations to activate and how far to push it once it begins attacking. Push it just enough and they can win the day. Push it too much and failing a morale test will break it.
Freeman's Farm has been designed for easy set up and quick game play. Game unit placement is shown on the game
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board and units are wooden markers representing troop and artillery formations.
Both sides require you to make hard choices on which for-mations to activate, how long you want them to press their at-tacks, and when and where to move them. Building momentum with your formations is important. Choosing how to use your momentum is critical. Use it well and your formations can break the enemy’s formations in a closely contested fight. Squander your momentum and the battle is lost. $60 https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1040417273/freemans-farm-1777?ref=745636&token=3286e2ac&utm_campaign =04e2c37ee7-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2019_02_14_12_ 20&utm_medium=email&utm_source=Newsletter+Subscribers&utm_term=0_899ff40d70-04e2c37ee7-238726261
War Along the Great Lakes allows gamers to refight the British defense of Upper Canada against the American invaders during the summer of 1814. The British have fewer troops than the Americans and a long line to defend. But the quality of their British regulars and Canadian militia is excellent. The Ameri-cans have stripped the Chesapeake and Champlain theaters to place its best and largest army on the Niagara, hoping to occupy Upper Canada before the war ends.
The game uses the proven Blue & Gray combat system where morale is as important as the number of soldiers. You are limited in how many units you may move based on the number of action points you receive, plus a random number of action points based on your commander. This means no two games will play alike. Movement is location to location. When the two armies end a move in the same location a battle occurs and the action moves to the battle board. $85 https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1456271622/war-along-the-great-lakes?ref=442835& token =bbe4d9d5&utm_ cam-paign=ddf51a01a2-EMAIL_ CAMPAIGN_ 2019_02_21_10_ 42&utm_medium=email&utm _source=Newsletter+Subscribers &utm_term=0_899ff40d70-ddf51a01a2-238726261
MAGAZINES Modern War #41 Sixth Fleet is a two-player, strategic-level wargame of the struggle for the Mediterranean set during a hy-pothetical Warsaw Pact versus NATO war during the 1970s and 1980s. It is primarily a naval-air conflict, with some elements of power projection using ground forces. The game map repre-sents various sea zones (or zones) within the Mediterranean, as well as adjoining land areas. Critical bases for both sides, in-cluding neutral nations are also depicted. Aircraft units represent one to six squadrons, with the counter displaying the primary type of aircraft. Ship units rep-resent one fleet aircraft carrier or battleship and “divisions” of four cruisers or nuclear-powered submarines with de-stroyers being represented in squadrons of six to eight de-stroyers or non-nuclear subs. Other ship types are repre-sented at the division level and represent various numbers of ship types. On the map, each inch equals 20 miles. Each turn represents from one day to one week of activity, depending on the level of activity. Sixth Fleet is based on Red Dragon Ris-ing. Changes have been made based on the situation in the Mediterranean during the Cold War. $40 https://shop.strategyandtacticspress.com/ProductDetails.asp?ProductCode=MW41 Slingshot 323, March/April 2019 Contains articles on The Battle of Thapsus - by Aaron Bell 6mm Accessories - by David Kay Over by Vespers: a Mediaeval Scenario Game - by Anthony Clipsom The Battle of the Kalka River - by Periklis Deligiannis Inventing Early Bronze Age Scenarios - by Steven Neate Arausio Refought with DBA - by Andy Offen The Long, the Short and the Flat: the Origin of the Longbow - by Anthony Clipsom As well as all the usual features. http://www.soa.org.uk/joomla/ Strategy & Tactics #316 The Campaigns of 1777 is a two-player, point to point wargame in which you command the Pa-triots or the British in the northern Colonies during 1777, the critical year in the American War for Independence. The tone for the British was set by leaders like Howe, Burgoyne, Corn-wallis, and Clinton while the Patriots marched with leaders like Washington, Greene, Arnold, Schuyler, and Gates. The Battles fought in the northern Colonies include the Sieges of Fort Ticonderoga and Fort Stanwix, the battles of Brandy-wine, Germantown, and Saratoga as well as the surrender of Burgoyne’s army at Saratoga. The objective of the British player is to control certain spaces in order to fulfill their Victory Conditions. The Patriot player’s objective is simply to pre-
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vent the British Victory. One inch on the map represents about 20 miles. Each Strength Point (SP) represents an understrength regiment of roughly 300 to 500 men. Each game turn represents one to three weeks. $40 https://shop.strategyandtacticspress.com/ProductDetails.asp?ProductCode=ST316 Strategy & Tactics Quarterly #5 - French Foreign Legion: A historical analysis of the French Foreign Legion. This issue will look at the founding of the Foreign Legion and their participa-tion and evolution in conflicts through the 19th century to the present. This issue includes a map poster. $15 https://shop.strategyandtacticspress.com/ProductDetails.asp?ProductCode=STQ5
World at War #65 Operation Typhoon is a solitaire opera-tional-strategic simulation that covers the final advance toward Moscow of Germany’s Army Group Center late in 1941. The player actively commands the German forces, while the rules system directs you in the handling of Soviet forces. The system allows the player to plan and execute his advance towards Mos-cow with the Soviet defending forces being randomly created in each hex dependent on the terrain. You win or lose, ultimately, based on the timely seizure of key areas on the map. Each game turn equals one or two weeks. Though designed for solitaire play, Operation Typhoon is easily adaptable to cooperative team play. One person can ad-ministratively handle the Soviets while the other actively com-mands the German force. Alternatively, one player can com-mand the three northern German armies and panzer groups while the other commands the three southern formations. The game map represents the terrain in the operational area of Mos-cow, with each unit representing the historical German divi-sions and randomly generated Soviet defending forces. $40 https://shop.strategyandtacticspress.com/ProductDetails.asp?ProductCode=WW65
DOMBROWSKI-SEDLITZ HELICOPTER As World War Two loomed on the horizon, a number of the more progressive thinkers on the Polish general staff realized that mobility would be a great factor against the German Panzers if fighting broke out. This meant rapid movement of their elite cavalry and horse-drawn artillery—faster than even the Polish railway system could carry them. Finally, a design submitted by the famous Polish aero firm of Dombrowski-Sedlitz was settled upon, a secret helicopter-autogiro machine powerful enough to lift a mounted cavalry battalion of five 85mm artillery pieces and caissons. However, its 6000-hp diesel locomotive engine, coupled with the riveted, sheet-iron construction of the fuselage, left the Dom-browski-Sedlitz weighing a hefty 56 tons. This gave it barely enough power to lift itself into the ozone, much less its pay load. What's more, the engine took up so much room that the only remaining space was consumed by the pilot and three mechanics it took to operate the craft while in flight. This handicap, plus a vexing tendency for the machine to break its manual, nonsyn-chro, three-speed transmission—leaving the propellers powerless—forced its grounding after two flights. Minus its wheels and propellers, it presently powers a Ferris wheel and merry-go-round at the People's amusement park in Bydgoszcz.